Why People Click returned to NC Tech 4 Good Conference for the second year in a row. This year, company founder Rob Ainbinder was invited to present a half-day workshop entitled "Effective Use of Google AdWords for Non-Profits".

The NCTech4Good Conference brings together nonprofit professionals, businesses, and volunteers to collaborate, innovate, and explore ways to use technology to advance the mission of nonprofit organizations.

The Conference features a full day workshop and a day of pre-selected sessions, spontaneous sessions, and many opportunities to network. It will:

encourage technology innovation in your organization

help solve technology challenges you face

connect you to fellow do-gooders with whom you can share ideas, resources, and solutions.

About NC Tech 4 Good

NCTech4Good is the regional network for sharing knowledge about technologies that can advance the mission of nonprofit organizations. This sharing occurs during monthly meetings on the third Wednesday of the month, 6:30-8:30 p.m., and at the annual conference. Join the group at the Meetup site.

Why People Click is a digital marketing agency that helps small to medium size businesses and nonprofits increase their effectiveness in reaching the right person at the right moment. We develop and implement marketing strategies that deliver results. On the web at www.whypeopleclick.com

What is Marketing Data?

In the context of this post, marketing data is any measurement of a marketing channel’s effectiveness. Marketing data could include email open and clickthrough rates paired with the campaign data logged in Google Analytics to help you understand what visitors from your email newsletter did after clicking through to your website. Other marketing data might be the people who registered at your tradeshow booth. Still more data can be gleaned from Social Media. Ultimately you want to understand the effectiveness of your marketing activities toward some action by a prospect that engages with you.

Where to Find Good Marketing Data to Measure?

Good marketing data can be found in many places. Some of the more common places to find good marketing data are:

Should I Compare Our Company’s Marketing Data to Another Company for Measurement?

In general, we recommend you compare your marketing data to itself. Why is this? We have found that even within the same market verticals audiences tend to exhibit different characteristics between two companies. In addition, technical design factors can inhibit or, enhance a prospect’s path to purchase/lead. Put another way, your website or, your competitor’s could be faster, slower, look better or, worse on a smartphone. These and other factors would skew the comparison of your data to their data. Another example can be seen in comparing social media data to a competitor. Many factors influence the engagement of a post. From creative to the time of day, day of the week, to social channel posted, all of these factors can impact the data collected.

Can There Be Too Much Marketing Data?

Absolutely. If the data doesn’t contribute to some aspect of your marketing, be it the contribution of a programmatic ad campaign to awareness, effectiveness of your welcome/new subscriber email, defined goals in Google Analytics or, funnel steps in your marketing automation it might be data that you don’t need to track or, otherwise include.

Need Help with Your Marketing Data?
We’ve helped companies big and small with their marketing data questions. From Google Analytics to email, SEM, social media data and more. Sifting through it all can be a big deal and it’s mission critical. If you don’t have a measurement framework in place and know what you are measuring, contact us

Jenny Moore, Development Manager Public Relations & Marketing for Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest NC said that, “with the launch of this blog, we have the opportunity to tell the human side of the story of food insecurity in our local communities and also to lift up the many ways people and organizations are coming together to provide food for today and hope for tomorrow for struggling families.”

“Non profit or for profit, it’s essential for organizations of all sizes to be able to tell their story in ways that move people to action, be that through blogposts, photos, videos or podcasts.” said Rob Ainbinder, principal at Why People Click. “This blog gives Second Harvest the flexibility to tell their stories how they wish and in a meaningful and compelling way.”

The blog was built on the WordPress platform leveraging Second Harvest’s existing relationship with Why People Click for strategy and design and Second Harvest’s webhost partner Host Rocket.

Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest NC is a proud resource and partner for more than 450 on-the-ground food assistance programs across an 18-county service region. Together, we address immediate needs for food assistance in our communities and work to end hunger through education, outreach, advocacy and collaborative partnerships working to support long-term, positive change for families.

About Why People Click

Why People Click is a digital marketing agency that helps small to medium size businesses and nonprofits increase their effectiveness in reaching the right person at the right moment. We develop and implement marketing strategies that deliver results. On the web at www.whypeopleclick.com

So, you’ve just put together what you think will be an awesome blog post. But, there a few spots you’d like to see images. Because as we all know, images help move the reader through your post and connect your writing to the visual and get more readership.

Or, maybe you need an image for your YouTube/Vlog intro?

When it comes to images you do not want to just search Google Images for the first one that makes sense, crop it and drop it in. That could potentially wind you up in court, or, at least a DCMA take down request.

One way to avoid all that messy stuff previously mentioned is to use royalty free images. What follows are my personal bookmarks to some of the better sites that allow you to use images royalty free for commercial and non-commercial work.

Pixabay

Pixabay – One of my favorites! Pixabay really set’s itself apart by offering over 730,000 high-quality photos, illustrations, and vector graphics for FREE. All the images on Pixabay are free for commercial use with no attribution required.

Unsplash

Unsplash – Beautiful photos added daily. Download without an account. Definitely one site to check out regularly.

PicJumbo

PicJumbo – This one isn’t completely free. But there are many free photos. A membership with more premium collections available.

Morguefile

Morguefile – One of the grand dads of royalty free photo sites. You can download and modify the images from Morguefile for free. If you use the image unaltered you must give credit to the photographer. Watch out for their site search the refers you off-site to continue your search on paid sites like iStock.

Free Images.com

Free Images – (Formerly SXC.hu) This was my original go to site for images for many years. And it’s still one I keep in rotation. You do have to create an account and there are some reasonable limits in the license that you might want to read over. Like, don’t use the image as part of a brand/company/product name.

Dreamstime

Dreamstime Free Images – This site has many free images in a free image collection which seems to be updated fairly regularly. Worth checking out if the sites on this list don’t work out.

What are your favorite sites for royalty free images for commercial use? Did I miss any? Let me know in the comments.

Rob Ainbinder, founder of Why People Click, presented “Why Blogging is Important for Your Brand & Your Business” at the Lewisville – Clemmons Chamber of Commerce July meeting on 7/12/2016 at the Historic Broyhill in Clemmons. The Summer theme of the meeting was great idea with attendees getting to play with sand. The half hour presentation covered Rob’s evolution as a lifestyle blogger as well as a lively exercise generating blog post titles and ideas.

Blogging Presentation

About Why People Click
Why People Click works with small to medium size business and nonprofits to help them find their voice, grow their reputation and connect with the right audience through strategy and carefully executed digital tactics.

About the Lewisville – Clemmons Chamber of CommerceThe Lewisville-Clemmons Chamber of Commerce is a great place for you and your business. Chamber members have the opportunity to make new business contacts, take advantage of training and educational opportunities, and find low-cost opportunities for promoting your business in the local community. Visit the Lewisville – Clemmons Chamber of Commerce website here

ASHEBORO, NC – Why People Click, CEO, Rob Ainbinder announces that his internet marketing firm “has achieved official Google Certified AdWords Partner status and that we have worked hard to meet the qualifications to earn this distinction”.

What is a Google Certified AdWords Partner?

To become a Google Certified AdWords Partner we go through hours of training, passing multiple tests and prove our experience through managing our clients PPC accounts in line with Google’s best practices. By earning the Partner badge, Google states this shows that “our business is healthy, our clients are happy, and that we follow Google best practices”.

Why Should You Work with a Google Certified AdWords Partner?As a Google Certified AdWords Partner, Why People Click can help when you don’t want to go it alone. We can set up, optimize and maintain your Google AdWords advertising. That means you’re free to spend more time actually working on your business. Hiring a Google Certified AdWords Partner to manage your AdWords account can help save you time and maximize your return on investment.

What Makes Why People Click Different from the Competition?In order to remain a Google Certified AdWords Partner, we need to stay up to date on the latest Google tools and products by passing Google-administered certification exams every 18 months. In addition, we work directly with Google to receive access to the latest training and product updates in order to stay on top of what’s going on with Google. You can trust that we are constantly working to stay up to date to help your ads perform their best. As a Google Certified AdWords Partner we also adhere to Google’s Third Party Policy.

Why People Click is a digital marketing agency that helps small to medium size businesses and nonprofits increase their effectiveness in reaching the right person at the right moment. We develop and implement marketing strategies that deliver results and increase customer satisfaction. On the web at www.whypeopleclick.comInterested in learning more about Pay-Per-Click and would like to see how a Google AdWords campaign could benefit your company? Contact us. We would be happy to put together a complimentary report that details the amount of traffic you could expect from a campaign based on different levels of ad spend.

In the early years of Search Engine Optimization and Content Marketing you could get away with stuffing keywords on a page to “game” the search engines (Google, BING, Yahoo) and it worked. However, there were two downsides to this practice. One, it’s a technique that was eventually discouraged and finally, penalized by the search engines. Second, this technique flat out sucked for the visitor/reader. Anyone actually reading a “wall of repeating text” stuffed with keywords wasn’t going to hang around long and probably wouldn’t want to do business with you. These were the Dark Ages of Content Marketing when SEO was the master. Eventually, search engines got wise to what was going on and adjusted their algorithms.

Not everyone made changes and some flat out refused to adjust their tactics. This was certainly to the detriment of their lead generating activities. If you’ve read online for any amount of time or, you are trying to attract and engage with prospective customers online you’ve (hopefully) adjusted your strategy over the years.

In a recent post by Mark Schafer he says, “I made a decision at the beginning of my blogging career to write for readers and NOT write for SEO.” And this got us thinking.. is their some seismic shift in content marketing? Or, some new standard for writing for the web?

We aren’t in complete agreement that we should NOT write for SEO. Rather, we’ve thought that SEO should be moved from the role of a strict master to that of a student. In other words, when we write, write with SEO in mind… not strictly for SEO (like the old days) AND write for your visitor/customer.

If we take the approach of SEO as student in content marketing there are several benefits:

We are mindful of changes that need to be made to content marketing and strategy due to changes by search engines

We keep the needs of our prospective customers in mind as well.

Was SEO ever the master? Or, always the student? Let us know what you think in the comments.

About NCTech4Good Conference

The NCTech4Good Conference brings together nonprofit professionals, businesses, and volunteers to collaborate, innovate, and explore ways to use technology to advance the mission of nonprofit organizations.

The Conference features a full day workshop and a day of pre-selected sessions, spontaneous sessions, and many opportunities to network. It will:

encourage technology innovation in your organization;

help solve technology challenges you face; and

connect you to fellow do-gooders with whom you can share ideas, resources, and solutions.

About NCTech4Good

NCTech4Good is the regional network for sharing knowledge about technologies that can advance the mission of nonprofit organizations. This sharing occurs during monthly meetings on the third Wednesday of the month, 6:30-8:30 p.m., and the annual conference. Join the group at the Meetup site.

About Why People Click

Why People Click is a digital marketing agency that helps small to medium size businesses and nonprofits increase their effectiveness in reaching the right person at the right moment. We develop and implement marketing strategies that deliver results and increase customer satisfaction. On the web at www.whypeopleclick.com

Ainbinder will speak as part of a panel “The Signal and the Noise: Standing Out From The Crowd” aimed at helping blogging dads in attendance more effectively serve their audience and enable them to reach their goals amid a crowded universe of individual publishing platforms.

The conference attracts dads and brands from all over the country and internationally. This year the conference has registered over 400 attendees.

DAD 2.0 SUMMIT, started in 2012, is a conference where marketers, social media leaders, and blogging parents connect to discuss the changing voice and perception of modern fatherhood.

More men are defying stereotypes by taking active roles in their children’s lives, making day-to-day household purchasing decisions regarding products and services, and chronicling these experiences online. The Dad 2.0 Summit is an open conversation about the commercial power of dads online, as well as an opportunity to learn the tools and tactics used by influential bloggers to create high-quality content, build personal brands, and develop viable business models. To learn more about the summit please visit www.dad2summit.com

About Why People Click

Why People Click is a digital marketing agency that helps small to medium size businesses and nonprofits increase their effectiveness in reaching the right person at the right moment. We develop and implement marketing strategies that deliver results and increase customer satisfaction. On the web at www.whypeopleclick.com

About XY Media Group, LLC

XY Media is the leading interactive agency that specializes in connecting brands with today’s men and fathers. It’s our mission to promote positive and authentic images of modern fatherhood, while helping brands connect with dads via authentic messages, memorable engagements and thoughtful relationships. We care about fatherhood because we are dads ourselves. And we believe that any story about marketing to adult men is a story of today’s dads. On the web at www.xymediagroup.com

Understanding Google Analytics Website Goals

“We have so much data on the web, almost all of it available for free, that we dive into the data ocean hoping that magically awesome things will follow. They never do.”

― Avinash Kaushik, Digital Marketing Evangelist - Google

If you're a business owner, marketing manager or, agency owner this blog post is for you. Do you "not quite" understand Google Analytics reports? Maybe your eyes just glaze over at the sight of any of those dashboard reports that mysteriously show up in your email every month? Or, you find yourself scratching your head as something like this stares back at you when you log-in?

The challenge is that your business is going 100 mph forward and this is a look in the rearview!
In fact, every single report IS a look back. So, what's the point? Collectively, some of this can help make decisions going forward.

Do You Have Website Goals Defined?

In Google Analytics go to Conversions > Goal Report. Are there signs of life or, do you get this?

Aww, website goals aren't enabled. 🙁

If you are seeing this screen, stop here. Go back to your web designer and ask for at least one goal to be set up. In many cases, it's just a matter of tracking a meaningful action that is already happening on your site. This goal could be something like:

a contact form submission

e-mail submission

whitepaper download

newsletter subscription

donation

e-commerce order confirmation

Once your web designer has setup the goal on your site and in your Google Analytics, you'll begin to see a report like this. In Google Analytics go to: Conversions > Goal Report

Now we are on to something! And if you see a screen like this, congratulations! You are on your way to some meaningful information.

All Website Goals Aren't Equal

It would be helpful at this point to mention that all of your web site goals aren't equally important. But, how do you know? By taking steps to define them and integrate them into a measurement frame model you can tie this into different types of priorities. The steps to developing website goals include:

Identify the business objectives upfront and set the broadest parameters for the work we are doing.

Identify goals for each business objective.

Write down the key performance indicators.

Set parameters for success upfront by identifying targets for each KPI.

Identify the segments of people / behavior / outcomes that we’ll analyze to understand why we succeed or failed.

In our next post we'll break down these steps into some meaningful ways to measure.